"Contrary to popular belief, de Blasio and Cuomo were at one point friends. When Cuomo was the secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), under President Bill Clinton, he even chose de Blasio to run HUD's New York-New Jersey office, a highly coveted, influential position. De Blasio came highly recommended from Bill Clinton, having run the New York state office for his campaign in the 1996 presidential election, and then considered a political wunderkind of sorts. The two had common bonds: Both were rising stars in the Democratic Party, and Italian.

Over the next decade, however, their politics began to split. Cuomo was a true Clintonite, promoting the New Democrat blend of pro-business policies with a sting of social liberalism when he unsuccessfully ran for governor in 2002, and then, successfully, in 2010. Meanwhile, de Blasio continually sided with the party's then-burgeoning Bernie wing, as both city councilman and the city's public advocate. He boosted his profile by marching with the Occupy Wall Street movement (whose supporters had criticized Cuomo for not initially supporting a millionaire's tax) and his "Tale of Two Cities" mayoral campaign (its name, coincidentally, ripped from Mario Cuomo's famous convention speech in 1984).”*